


glazed already the eye, yet life struggles hard

by tortoiseshells



Category: Mercy Street (TV)
Genre: Ambiguously Between 2x04 and 2x06, Angst, Canon Compliant, Canon Dialogue, F/M, Gen, Guilty Conscience, Henry Hopkins is Canonically A Mess, Season/Series 02, offscreen death, out of chronological order
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-22
Updated: 2018-09-22
Packaged: 2019-07-15 16:54:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,338
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16067336
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tortoiseshells/pseuds/tortoiseshells
Summary: Emma Green is before him, again. “Forgive me,” she is saying, as if it were possible for this to be her sin and not his, “Chaplain, I-“Henry Hopkins can't admit what he's done.





	glazed already the eye, yet life struggles hard

He remembers the cold of the evening, the seizing and gasping of his lungs, and Emma Green: helping him out of the river, small hands on his arm, her soft voice saying – 

**.**

“-what happened at the river?”

He had words for it, but they are stuck fast in his heart, hard and knotted in his throat. The greater his effort to say them, the more breathless he becomes. He tries to circle it, but it is too large for man to fathom, too vast for him to know. God on high, he does know what he’s done, but he can’t even say it, can’t even think its name.

Henry Hopkins won’t remember, can’t remember – his mind only takes him so far, to Emma Green, flushed and soft and radiant, before and after – the river in between and – 

No, he’s remembering wrong – 

“What happened at the river,” she is saying, and what she is saying burns, “it wasn’t your –“

**.**

“Your memory is lost,” he is telling a man without a face, who does not know what he’s done. The man looks at him wildly, fear the only thing Henry Hopkins can see in his eyes. It’s not his fault he is like this. It’s not His fault, either. It is the wickedness of man, he wants to say, the wickedness of man has burned his skin away and stolen his memory like a thief in the night.

Really, how can he know? The only thing he’s assured of, now, is what he is, what he saw reflected in the river. A face in the water. He is a m–

No, no, no. This is not what he is. This poor man is not guilty of that crime. Whether or not he ever remembers who he was, before he burned, Henry Hopkins knows, he promises him, “Your soul is-“

**.**

“-clean,” Emma Green is saying, standing behind him. If her gaze had felt like judgment before, now it is a punishment and he cannot bear it. He is not strong enough.

He is on his knees before Emma Green. He recalls: he falls to his knees as soon as he is out of the river, falls at the feet of Emma Green. Her hands on his back, his face. He feels her touch like a brand, though it is not her that burns him. _Henry_ , she is saying, and a handful of moments ago, he would have thought it the best sound in the world. He had wanted it so long, and now he cannot, must not, will not.

He is on his knees, he is shying away from her. She looks at him and he does not want to be seen, not like this, not for what he truly is. Not by God above. Not by Emma Green. 

He does not say anything. He recalls: her hand in the damp shirt at his elbow, helping him to stand, he does not say anything. He does not say anything to her, he brushes her off. 

Why isn’t she afraid of him? He is a m–

She sighs. “I’ve been –“

**.**

“–delicate in my attempts to speak with you,” Emma Green is saying, and he doesn’t want to listen. She is standing in front of him and will not let him by.

It is just as well she has stopped saying his name. If she does not, he does not remember her smile in the dark he feels rather than sees, that her pulse jumps under his touch, that she welcomes his hands on her waist and moves closer. If she does not say his name, he does not remember what came before: that she is as beautiful as an angel, that her heart is kind, that her soul is stubborn and wants to be good, that his life is a precious thing to her. 

What he remembers is this: that his blood rushes and he is dizzy with it, that he has never so thoroughly understood temptation, that Emma Green is more precious to him than anything in this world or the world to come. He will pay any price to keep her. He remembers: the crack of a shot, the smell of gunpowder, Emma gasps. He remembers: the glint of a barrel across the river, the sudden cold where he had burned under her hands.

The river is like ice. He doesn’t feel it. He doesn’t feel pain where he was shot, or where the blows land. What is real to him is – 

Emma Green is standing on the riverbank, and he falls at her feet. Her hands on his back, his face. She says his name, and there is no fear of him in it. 

She will not let him by. She can say nothing new, nothing that she has not already said, nothing that he has not already told himself, but she will not let him by, will not leave him to what he deserves. Her gaze is judgment and punishment combined. 

She breathes deep, and braces herself. “Now I’ll be-“

**.**

“-be married legally, under God,” Emma Green says, and he feels perilously, blessedly, close to annihilation. 

She doesn’t know that her name follows swiftly every thought he’s had of the sacrament, that it has for months. He remembers: he is lost to this blue-eyed belle before he sees her compassion, her goodness. He remembers: in his room, in the dark, that loving her beauty before he’s seen her soul will be a shame that follows him. He remembers: the many times he sees Emma Green for what she is, and that he –

If he had, if he has – but he doesn’t. It’s lust.

He does not want to think of this anymore. 

**.**

Henry Hopkins tries to forget. Tries to remember where he was before:

Emma Green breathes deep, and braces herself. “Now I’ll be-“

**.**

“-sorry,” he is saying to the faceless man. It’s just a word, and spoken to the wrong man. The soldier cannot hear his apology. 

Henry Hopkins turns and runs, from the man who needs counsel, from his abject failure, from what he won’t let himself remember. It follows, like his shadow. Stuck to his soul. He wonders if he has not already been branded where he burned, if he has been marked, like Cain, for m– 

Emma Green is before him, again. “Forgive me,” she is saying, as if it were possible for this to be her sin and not his, “Chaplain, I-“

**.**

“-I broke because-“ he is saying, because she doesn’t understand, doesn’t fear him. And because she doesn’t, she won’t let go. She must let him go. He will make her go.

He tells her what he is, what he has been his whole life. Emma Green is not afraid of him, still. If there is fear in her eyes, it is fear for him, and for a moment, he remembers: that she trembles as she stands like an angel on the stone wall, that she watches him as he moves between the wounded, that she bandages his wounded arm and does not let go.

He remembers: she is flushed and soft and radiant. He remembers: she steps into his arms, and he feels as though he has found his home. 

He remembers: the snap of a shot, the cold of the river, a man’s neck in his hands. 

He will pay any price to keep her. He remembers: he does. 

The words are hard and knotted in his throat: “-because of my weakness for-“ 

**.**

“You must only say the words,” Emma Green is pleading.

He knows without looking what he will see: her small hands folded against her dirty apron, face pale, eyes wide and bright from the hurt. She is his weakness, and because he is weak, he looks. He’s hurting her. What greater distance has he to fall for it, for losing himself to lust, for abandoning her? Surely not far, not if he has already become a m–

“Find someone else,” he says, “Anyone can say the words.”

**Author's Note:**

> Title from Whitman's "The Wound-Dresser" again. I suppose this is a follow-up to _follow without noise and be strong of heart_ , so, it made sense at the time.
> 
> I wanted to mess around with tenses and memory, but I'm afraid this got a little self-indulgent.


End file.
